Progetto DIN

Increases in extremism, populism and demagoguery strongly affect human rights, democracy, and the “European Project”. Currently, especially young people of Muslim background and with hyphenated identities are victims of discrimination. Lack of cohesion, mistrust and increased tensions are on the rise in neighbourhoods of big cities across Europe.Youth of North African background, especially young boys, don’t see perspective and they have the highest risk of dropping out of school and they complaining about discrimination at work place, on the street and in school. This project is focused mainly on the discrimination and spirals of violence and discrimination in neighbourhoods.

We envision ways to raise voice of youth with fewer opportunities about discrimination in their neighbourhood with debats, action plans so that local, national and European authorities listen to them, because it affects their future and simultaneously it also affects long-term peace and stability of our countries and continent. We want to make this process as youth driven as possible, therefore we aim to work with young role who are directly involved with youth groups in their local neighbourhoods.

Our long-term aims are therefore:

To deepen the understanding of root causes of ‘why some neighbourhoods or young people are excluded from society’, on the side of society and affected young people.This will happen through dialogue and debates at all levels and we hope it will also lead to better understanding of how these young people socio-psychologically cope with different kind of socio%u2010economic strains. By gaining insight into the issue, we can then devise ways to supporProposal: developing network Changing the Neighborhood against Discriminationyouth to overcome minor and major setbacks in a structural way and ensure that their complaints about discrimination are addressed effectively.

To create a community of young people with fewer opportunities, who are motivated and able to debate and participate in a dialogue with policy makers about their problems and possible solutions to these problems.

To bring youth responses and their perspectives about the root causes and solutions of their neighbourhoods into societal and political discussions on local, national and international level across Europe.

To convince policy makers at all levels to listen to youth perspectives, to debate with them in an equal way and to integrate youth perspectives in policies and practices.

To contribute to the long term institutional change in which national and European authorities recognise that many young people – and the neighbourhoods where they grow up- are ‘hidden’ from the society. Our long-term aim is to convince policy makers to listen to young people with fewer opportunities either due to mental problems, social economic problems, or because of their cultural background. Therefore we aim for authorities to understand the challenges, social circumstances and perspectives of young people, so they can act accordingly and improve the situation. This will inevitably lead to necessary changes in institutional policies and practices addressing the multi-cultural demographic changes in Europe.